Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for delivering various types of payloads to the upper atmosphere and beyond, and more particularly to a high cyclic rate launch rate rocket launcher with an upper launch station. The cables' self weight is offset by lighter-than-air balloons. The cables are tensioned by one or more lighter-than-air balloons and anchored by a pivoting tether.
Description of the Prior Art
Many methods of delivering useful materials such as propellants, gases for life support, etc. and fabricated items to the upper atmosphere or beyond, exist or have been proposed in recent publications.
These primarily involve rockets powered by chemical, nuclear or ground based laser or maser energy sources. Various methods of reducing the cost per unit mass of delivering useful materials and fabricated items to the upper atmosphere or beyond, which involve rockets, exist or have been proposed.
These included re-usable rocket powered vehicles such as the soon to be retired United States of America's Space Shuttle, or Russia's now inoperative Buran. Currently, only chemical multi-stage rockets or vehicles with strap on solid fuel powered rocket boosters, or rockets such as the USA's diminutive Pegasus, which is transported to high altitude before launch, are known to be in service.
Proposed methods of decreasing the delivery cost to the upper atmosphere or beyond, most commonly involve transferring energy to the rockets by increasing either their initial kinetic or potential energy before igniting the main motor or motors. Proposals by which this can be achieved include: elevation suspended under a disposable, free flight, lighter-than-air balloon or, forcible ejection at high velocity from large guns utilizing either chemical propellants or compressed air or compressed hydrogen or, transport to high altitude attached to airplanes such as Virgin Galactic's White Knight Two or, transport to high altitude towed on a cable tether behind an airplane or, acceleration to high velocity using ground based linear induction motors or, jet or rocket powered sleds, prior to igniting the rocket's main motor or motors.
One proposed method for reducing the delivery cost, which does not involve rockets, is the so called “Space Elevator” where a large mass is tethered to the earth by a single cable many thousands of miles long. The large mass orbits the earth in a geosynchronous orbit and keeps the cable taut. This cable would then be used in a manner analogous to a railway track on which a train travels.
The primary difficulty with this latter method is that the tensile strength of the material required for the cable far exceeds any existing material, especially since the self weight of the cable would be considerable. Another difficulty is to supply the vehicle climbing this cable with sufficient energy to essentially climb out of the majority of the earth's gravitational field. A weightless, super strong, cable material would be ideal for such a “space elevator” but, this does not yet exist. Also, the problem of energy supply up thousands of miles of cable has prompted the consideration of beamed microwave or laser power to the climbing vehicle. The defocusing and obstructive effect of clouds and the atmosphere on the beamed power is likely to greatly reduce the amount of power that actually reaches the climbing vehicle. Dissipation of energy on the return of the (climbing) vehicle to the earth is likely to be quite wasteful because of the need for braking to prevent it from exceeding the speed capacity of the mechanism holding the said vehicle to the cable.
Many of the current proposed methods require the development of new materials or massive structures and are unlikely to see commercial service for many decades to come, if ever.
The majority of current launch methods involve the use of huge amounts of energy, derived primarily from fossil fuels such as coal or oil to produce cryogenic liquid oxygen oxidizer, cryogenic liquid hydrogen or other liquid hydrocarbon fuels or solid propellants. This use of non-renewable resources is inherently inefficient because at each stage of production of the fuels there is a compounding of process inefficiencies. As well, the large mass and sometimes toxic nature of exhaust material used to propel the vehicle out of the atmosphere frequently does ecological damage or may cause climatological disturbances.
Accordingly, a need exists for a method of delivering useful materials such as propellants, gases for life support, etc. and fabricated items to the upper atmosphere or beyond, at a cost per unit mass delivered, far less than currently commercially available, which utilizes currently available materials and technologies. Furthermore, it would be ecologically beneficial to minimize the mass of material used to propel the vehicle out of the earth's atmosphere by the use of hydroelectric, geothermal or solar photovoltaic generated electricity to raise the vehicle as high as possible before igniting the vehicle's engine or engines.
Atmospheric monitoring has been in effect for over fifty years. Measurement of solar radiation, concentrations of trace gases, temperature, pressure and other parameters, by which the direction of the earth's climatological changes can be predicted, has greatly increased our understanding of our world's climate. It is of particular importance with regards to the ozone hole, the continuous rise of carbon dioxide and other “greenhouse” gases in the atmosphere, and now, the more than fifty chemical species in the earth's atmosphere.
As increased levels of “greenhouse” and ozone depleting gases occur, such as carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons, nitrous oxide and sulfur hexafluoride, which cause global warming and other changes in the global weather, there arises an increased requirement for atmospheric monitoring on a more continuous basis. Current methods for monitoring atmospheric conditions involve heavily instrumented aircraft, manned and unmanned; free flight balloons with suspended instrument packages; rockets with sampling and instrument payloads; and ground based laser and radar stations.
These, with the exception of the ground based stations, cannot provide more than a relatively brief period of atmospheric data sampling. The longest duration of monitoring by non-ground based methods currently does not exceed more than a few days in the case of balloons, and the shortest, such as rockets, might be measured in minutes. Many of these methods of atmospheric monitoring also utilize single use instrument packages, while existing ground based stations cannot obtain physical samples to determine the chemical composition, the bacterial/viral content, or the intensity and spectral analysis of sunlight and other data throughout the depth of the atmosphere.
Thus, there exists a need for constructions extending from the surface of the earth to a great height, on which instrumentation for continuous monitoring and sampling of the atmosphere and, incident solar and other radiation may be mounted.
Radio telecommunications and over the horizon radar are being more extensively used for security reasons by many countries throughout the world.
The recent worldwide security concerns about surprise terrorist attacks has driven countries such as the United States of America to increase the level of surveillance by the use of radar and other means of detection utilizing various regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. This is evidenced by the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007 of Congress, relating in part to the interoperable radio telecommunication system for the security of the United States. The range of ground based radar is limited by the curvature of the earth's surface and, in an attempt to achieve greater useful ranges, radar and other systems have been mounted on high flying aircraft or low altitude tethered balloons.
In a similar way, cellular radio telephony operators are currently seeking to enlarge the area serviced by the use of high altitude aircraft, with receivers and transmitters, proposed to fly in closed circuits over the service area. The extreme high altitude cases of this are the INMARSAT and IRIDIUM satellite phone systems which utilize extremely expensive and unrepairable geostationary satellites for telecommunications.
Thus it may be seen that there is a need for lower cost, high altitude radar and radio telecommunications platforms.
The present invention also relates to tourism. The visitation of tall monuments such as the Eiffel Tower, tall buildings such as the Empire State Building, or high altitude natural features such as Mount Everest continues to be a common activity of tourists. Indeed, recently there has also been increasing non-military interest in expensive high altitude airplane flights. The recent “X Prize” for safe flight to 100 kilometers or higher won by Burt Rutan's Space Ship One is further driving the commercialization of high altitude transport. A problem with Space Ship One and Space Ship Two is that their rocket motors uses a liquified nitrous oxide oxidiser and hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene solid fuel, which solid fuel produces an exhaust which includes soot, partially burnt rubber and other noxious materials. In recent publications, it has been stated that alternative fuels for Space Ship Two are being investigated, asphalt and paraffin. It is likely that, although these are cheap fossil fuels, combustion will not be complete. Yielding polluting exhaust products, in the case of asphalt, metal oxides and acidic sulphur compounds are likely. The effect of the soot alone, recently calculated for 1,000 launches per year by Martin Ross of the Aerospace Corporation, suggests stratospheric disruption and soaring temperatures at the earth's poles. The launch rate published being only a few times per week.
There is therefore a growing market for less expensive more frequent transport of tourists to ever higher altitudes.
In the past few years, skydiving as a sport has changed to include ram air wing type parachutes, the use of auxiliary equipment such as small rigid wings, miniature surfboards, rockets and even miniature turbojet engines. Further, the altitude from which skydivers have been jumping from has been on the increase, although this has been limited by two major factors. These are the limited capability of civilian fixed wing airplanes and helicopters to operate at higher altitudes where there exists a civil aviation half hour limit for oxygen enriched breathing systems or, a requirement for a pressurized suit or cabin. In the short term, it is expected that civilian pressurized suits will become available to skydiving enthusiasts as the market for high altitude skydiving develops.
Even more extreme forms of sky diving are even now being considered. These proposed forms involve jumping from the upper reaches of the atmosphere or even re-entry from space, as might occur when occupants of distressed orbital spacecraft are to be returned safely to earth.
Thus, there is an increasing market for novel, and higher altitude platforms for the various new forms of skydiving. Indeed, there is also a continuing demand for low cost platforms at altitudes of up to ten thousand feet.
In recent times, the rapid deployment of aircraft to sites of military interest has become practically a necessity, for reconnaissance or other purposes. Additionally, there is a growing interest in commercial hypersonic transport. Towards this end, hypersonic aircraft with supersonic combustion engines are being developed in many countries to fulfil these perceived needs.
However, the engines of such aircraft, designed to operate efficiently at higher Mach numbers have been reported to require the attainment of a velocity in excess of three times the speed of sound for them to start. Considerable complexity, with a concomitant weight penalty is required for an engine to operate in the various flight regimes from stationary to hypersonic. Apart from using rocket boosters to achieving starting speed, the other design path appears to require a two part engine. The first part is a turbofan or turbojet engine which predominates in the flight regime from subsonic to low Mach number supersonic, transitioning to the supersonic combustion engine at high Mach numbers, and shutting down the first part.
Engines designed to operate in the hypersonic range only, many with no moving parts, would therefore be lighter in weight, simpler in construction, and hence less expensive.
In 2003, the manned space shuttle Columbia of the United States of America was destroyed upon re-entry into the earth's atmosphere, due to structural damage which occurred during the launch phase. As well, over time, there has also been an accumulation of orbital craft in need of repair; and distressed orbital craft, and objectionable and dangerous debris which needs to be removed from orbit.
Since craft such as the Columbia space shuttle of the United States are heavy, and they lack main engines that can operate for significant lengths of time after re-entry due to the hazards and weight penalties of carrying cryogenic or other fuels for use on the return flight in atmosphere, these craft must leave orbit at specific points if they are to be able to glide to the few airports with runways of sufficient strength and length which exist close to its orbital track.
Thus, it is inevitable that others will create smaller craft capable of performing useful work outside the atmosphere, with the capability of flying under their own power in subsonic, supersonic or sustained hypersonic flight in the earth's atmosphere. These are likely to be launched using rocket power and, after re-entry at any point, fly to any of the multitude of existing civilian or military airfields suitable for such smaller aircraft and, land safely.
These will be used for the quick, safe retrieval of passengers of damaged orbital craft and, repair or removal from orbit of distressed unmanned orbital craft, and objectionable and dangerous debris. Another type, soon to come into service, is a small service vehicle for refueling or attaching to distressed space craft and acting as a tug to extend the useful life of such vehicles. Further small craft or rockets can be used to launch small satellites, or modular components for the assembly and fuelling of large constructions in orbit which may be used to escape the earth's gravitational field to possibly deflect dangerous asteroids, or explore the solar system. The European Space Agency and Russian equivalent Roscosmos have recently begun to consider the creation of a shipyard in low earth obit to facilitate moon or mars missions utilizing the yet to be built cargo return advanced re-entry vehicle (ARV).
Additionally, it is expected that there will be a continuing need to service satellites and, other orbital craft. This servicing could include delivering food, fuel, compressed or liquefied gases for breathing or other uses, medical and scientific supplies, electrical, mechanical or other equipment to replace or upgrade spacecraft systems, transporting sick or injured personnel, or replacing personnel.
Thus, there is expected to be a need for a quick, inexpensive means of launching modular components for assembly and fuelling in space, small utility craft, small satellites and other devices.
The sensitivity of many telescopes used in astronomy has been greatly degraded due to atmospheric dust and aerosols as light is reflected or scattered by the aforementioned particles. The least affected telescopes are generally to be found at the top of remote mountains, above much of the atmosphere where most of the dust and aerosols are to be found.
Thus, there is a further need for high altitude platforms on which sensitive telescopes may be mounted. Particularly, multiple platforms and telescopes may be used to simulate an extremely large aperture telescope as currently used to locate planets in other solar systems.
As the Indonesian tsunami disaster unfolded in December 2004, it was clear that reconnaissance of many of the affected areas and subsequent delivery of initial relief supplies did not occur until days or even weeks after the event, with the consequence that many tens of thousands died, more than if early relief had been available. Thus, there is a need for a fast suborbital rocket launching system to deliver numerous small unmanned reconnaissance drones and thousands of tons of terminally GPS guided parachute delivered relief supplies using simple GPS-guided disposable rockets.